Compilation of Michael Jordan’s on-off data with the Bulls

[lessthanjake]

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I have updated and revamped the OP to account for the new information we have, and to make everything be in per-48-minutes terms.

I noted the issue Djoker raised above about the Thinking Basketball tracking data. I do think that’s an area where the data could theoretically be improved, since some of the Thinking Basketball data is definitely not entirely correct. Given the fact that that issue includes the 1995 playoffs and Djoker tracked that as well, I had the OP use Djoker’s tracking data for the 1995 playoffs instead of using Thinking Basketball for that year. I also added in a compilation of all the data we have (regular season + playoffs). At this point, we have data for over half of Jordan’s games with the Bulls, so it seemed worth providing a compilation of all that data put together. That said, there’s definitely sampling error there, which I noted in the revamped OP.

[Djoker]

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I have updated and revamped the OP to account for the new information we have, and to make everything be in per-48-minutes terms.

I noted the issue Djoker raised above about the Thinking Basketball tracking data. I do think that’s an area where the data could theoretically be improved, since some of the Thinking Basketball data is definitely not entirely correct. Given the fact that that issue includes the 1995 playoffs and Djoker tracked that as well, I had the OP use Djoker’s tracking data for the 1995 playoffs instead of using Thinking Basketball for that year. I also added in a compilation of all the data we have (regular season + playoffs). At this point, we have data for over half of Jordan’s games with the Bulls, so it seemed worth providing a compilation of all that data put together. That said, there’s definitely sampling error there, which I noted in the revamped OP.

Great work!

It's optional but maybe you can also give PHILA's alternative data for the 1992 postseason. +128 ON and +8 OFF actually aligns with the overall team margin of +136. Link to PHILA's thread is below. Scroll down to the Team Performance section.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1467808

EDIT: I also noticed you didn't add Squared2020's updated data for 1993 RS. He has sampled over 60 games. In case you need more work LOL.

[lessthanjake]

.

.

I have updated and revamped the OP to account for the new information we have, and to make everything be in per-48-minutes terms.

I noted the issue Djoker raised above about the Thinking Basketball tracking data. I do think that’s an area where the data could theoretically be improved, since some of the Thinking Basketball data is definitely not entirely correct. Given the fact that that issue includes the 1995 playoffs and Djoker tracked that as well, I had the OP use Djoker’s tracking data for the 1995 playoffs instead of using Thinking Basketball for that year. I also added in a compilation of all the data we have (regular season + playoffs). At this point, we have data for over half of Jordan’s games with the Bulls, so it seemed worth providing a compilation of all that data put together. That said, there’s definitely sampling error there, which I noted in the revamped OP.

Great work!

It's optional but maybe you can also give PHILA's alternative data for the 1992 postseason. +128 ON and +8 OFF actually aligns with the overall team margin of +136. Link to PHILA's thread is below. Scroll down to the Team Performance section.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1467808

EDIT: I also noticed you didn't add Squared2020's updated data for 1993 RS. He has sampled over 60 games. In case you need more work LOL.

I’ll take a look at the PHILA data you provided and perhaps change the OP to use that instead of the 1992 Thinking Basketball data. I tend to think we should favor tracking data that actually adds up to the exact margin of error over data that doesn’t, so I’d probably just replace the Thinking Basketball data for that year, like I did with your 1995 data.

As for Squared’s updated data for 1993, is there any way to access that? As far as I can tell, Squared has deleted the content of all his posts on this forum, and the link to the Jordan data on his website no longer works. I think perhaps the argument he had with AEnigma and others here may have unfortunately caused us to lose access to that data, but please let me know if I’m wrong about that. The only reason I was able to still use Squared’s data in the revamped post is that I had written down the plus-minus data and the exact games that were tracked for those years, but I didn’t do that for the updated 1993 stuff.

[lessthanjake]

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I have replaced the Thinking Basketball data for the 1992 playoffs with the data you linked to, since that data actually matches up to the total MOV.

I notice that that post actually also has plus-minus data for Jordan for 55 games of the 1992 regular season. The data is in per-100-possession form, so I’d need to convert it to per-48-minutes to add it, but I think I’ll do that eventually. We don’t otherwise have any data for the 1992 regular season. EDIT: I’ve now added this 1992 regular season data, noting that it does include data from two games Jordan missed that season.

[eminence]

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https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Z-0DQCSQr5vMLUp1zY4DbsmzBM4UFghqG4dc1eHfBh4/edit#gid=1672058251

The ons and whatnot are all /100 estimates, but the raw data should be there from Pollack in case you wanted to check out any non-MJ player (I believe from lorak)

[Djoker]

I have updated and revamped the OP to account for the new information we have, and to make everything be in per-48-minutes terms.

I noted the issue Djoker raised above about the Thinking Basketball tracking data. I do think that’s an area where the data could theoretically be improved, since some of the Thinking Basketball data is definitely not entirely correct. Given the fact that that issue includes the 1995 playoffs and Djoker tracked that as well, I had the OP use Djoker’s tracking data for the 1995 playoffs instead of using Thinking Basketball for that year. I also added in a compilation of all the data we have (regular season + playoffs). At this point, we have data for over half of Jordan’s games with the Bulls, so it seemed worth providing a compilation of all that data put together. That said, there’s definitely sampling error there, which I noted in the revamped OP.

Great work!

It's optional but maybe you can also give PHILA's alternative data for the 1992 postseason. +128 ON and +8 OFF actually aligns with the overall team margin of +136. Link to PHILA's thread is below. Scroll down to the Team Performance section.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1467808

EDIT: I also noticed you didn't add Squared2020's updated data for 1993 RS. He has sampled over 60 games. In case you need more work LOL.

I’ll take a look at the PHILA data you provided and perhaps change the OP to use that instead of the 1992 Thinking Basketball data. I tend to think we should favor tracking data that actually adds up to the exact margin of error over data that doesn’t, so I’d probably just replace the Thinking Basketball data for that year, like I did with your 1995 data.

As for Squared’s updated data for 1993, is there any way to access that? As far as I can tell, Squared has deleted the content of all his posts on this forum, and the link to the Jordan data on his website no longer works. I think perhaps the argument he had with AEnigma and others here may have unfortunately caused us to lose access to that data, but please let me know if I’m wrong about that. The only reason I was able to still use Squared’s data in the revamped post is that I had written down the plus-minus data and the exact games that were tracked for those years, but I didn’t do that for the updated 1993 stuff.

Yea some links on Squared's site are down.

Luckily I saved the data. The 3rd and 4th images include the data for 1992-93 RS, 63 games in all.

[lessthanjake]

Great work!

It's optional but maybe you can also give PHILA's alternative data for the 1992 postseason. +128 ON and +8 OFF actually aligns with the overall team margin of +136. Link to PHILA's thread is below. Scroll down to the Team Performance section.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1467808

EDIT: I also noticed you didn't add Squared2020's updated data for 1993 RS. He has sampled over 60 games. In case you need more work LOL.

I’ll take a look at the PHILA data you provided and perhaps change the OP to use that instead of the 1992 Thinking Basketball data. I tend to think we should favor tracking data that actually adds up to the exact margin of error over data that doesn’t, so I’d probably just replace the Thinking Basketball data for that year, like I did with your 1995 data.

As for Squared’s updated data for 1993, is there any way to access that? As far as I can tell, Squared has deleted the content of all his posts on this forum, and the link to the Jordan data on his website no longer works. I think perhaps the argument he had with AEnigma and others here may have unfortunately caused us to lose access to that data, but please let me know if I’m wrong about that. The only reason I was able to still use Squared’s data in the revamped post is that I had written down the plus-minus data and the exact games that were tracked for those years, but I didn’t do that for the updated 1993 stuff.

Yea some links on Squared's site are down.

Luckily I saved the data. The 3rd and 4th images include the data for 1992-93 RS, 63 games in all.

Thanks! I’ve updated the OP to account for the 63 games in the 1992-1993 season, instead of just 12 games. Since a lot of the Squared stuff has been taken down, I also added a link to your above post, so that people can still see the raw data if they want.

[Djoker]

Since I have the game tapes, I'm going to try and log the 1989 postseason in the coming days since that's the one piece of unreliable data we have left. 1990 has very minor inconsistencies and for 1992 we have Dipper13's data.

Looking at Ben's series tallies:

89 Cavs: +22 ON -18 OFF +4 margin -- matches
89 Knicks: +65 ON -30 OFF +25 margin -- off by 10; maybe typo; +55 ON or -40 OFF?
89 Pistons: -19 ON 12 OFF -25 margin -- off by 18

I will log the Knicks and Pistons series.

[Gregoire]

Since I have the game tapes, I'm going to try and log the 1989 postseason in the coming days since that's the one piece of unreliable data we have left. 1990 has very minor inconsistencies and for 1992 we have Dipper13's data.

Looking at Ben's series tallies:

89 Cavs: +22 ON -18 OFF +4 margin -- matches
89 Knicks: +65 ON -30 OFF +25 margin -- off by 10; maybe typo; +55 ON or -40 OFF?
89 Pistons: -19 ON 12 OFF -25 margin -- off by 18

I will log the Knicks and Pistons series.

Excellent work, man, thanks!

So, MJs career playoffs on-off per 100 poss is 14,7 with 7.55 ON. Maaan... LeBrons is 10,2 with 5,9 ON. Its not close actually the more we use analytical approach and impact data... In regular season I suppose the margin would be even wider because of "coasting".

[Djoker]

Since I have the game tapes, I'm going to try and log the 1989 postseason in the coming days since that's the one piece of unreliable data we have left. 1990 has very minor inconsistencies and for 1992 we have Dipper13's data.

Looking at Ben's series tallies:

89 Cavs: +22 ON -18 OFF +4 margin -- matches
89 Knicks: +65 ON -30 OFF +25 margin -- off by 10; maybe typo; +55 ON or -40 OFF?
89 Pistons: -19 ON 12 OFF -25 margin -- off by 18

I will log the Knicks and Pistons series.

Excellent work, man, thanks!

So, MJs career playoffs on-off per 100 poss is 14,7 with 7.55 ON. Maaan... LeBrons is 10,2 with 5,9 ON. Its not close actually the more we use analytical approach and impact data... In regular season I suppose the margin would be even wider because of "coasting".

Actually if we use the same methodology with Lebron and calculate per 48, he's at +11.7 ON-OFF with +5.5 ON. Jordan is at +14.5 ON-OFF with +6.7 ON according to the OP. There is a little bit of uncertainty with MJ's numbers but we can be very confident that he's in the +14 to +15 range for ON-OFF and +6.5 to +7 for ON. I'm working to clean up the 1989 data as well as the other years with smaller inconsistencies.

I don't know about the regular season but our MJ sample there is getting larger and larger. Maybe in a few years...

[Djoker]

...

Alright so I've been able to do some serious data clean-up. In this post I will summarize the updated data and point out a few small inconsistencies I see in the OP.

Regular Season

I looked at the Raw Plus Minus spreadsheet that I think Eminence also posted in this thread and realized that there is MJ regular season data for 1994-95 on there for the 17 games he played: +91 ON 668 ON Mins +26 OFF 153 OFF Mins. 1994-95 regular season can be added to the OP.

I noticed that the OP has different ON and OFF values for the 1987-88 season. Like mine, I think his data only includes the 42 full games and excludes the one game fragment on 01-09-88 so not sure why it's different?

I also have a different OFF for the 1992-93 season. For the 63 sampled games, the margin is +414 so since the ON is +489 the OFF value should be -75. Please confirm.



The total regular season data we have have for Jordan comprises 60% of his total career and 54% of his Bulls career.

Playoffs

First off I noticed a typo in the OP. The 1985 playoffs should have an OFF value of -32 and not -22.

I logged the Knicks and Pistons series for 1989 because the Thinking Basketball (TB) numbers didn't match the total score margins.

Knicks: +45 ON -20 OFF (was +65 ON -30 OFF)
Pistons: -16 ON -9 OFF (was -19 OFF +12 OFF)

1989 Total: +51 ON -47 OFF (was +63 ON -41 OFF)

I also logged the Sixers series for 1990 because the TB numbers again didn't match the total score margins.

Sixers: +45 ON -7 OFF (was +45 ON -9 OFF)

1990 Total: +100 ON -45 OFF (was +100 ON -47 OFF)

In the 1995 playoffs, I found an arithmetic error in Game 1 of the Hornets series that I logged. Instead of +11 ON -3 OFF it's actually +6 ON +2 OFF.

1995 Total: -14 ON +24 OFF (was -9 ON +19 OFF)

Here is the updated playoff picture.



I noticed some minor inconsistencies in both ON and OFF minutes but they aren't significant at all.

[OhayoKD]

Yeah, not sure about those 92 marks:

There is no way that +45 on/off net rating is remotely accurate.

1. Dipper had similarly high on/off estimates for Barkley (+36.3) and Hakeem (+34.5) but those estimates were disproven with Harvey Pollack's full season data.

Barkley net on/off
1987: +7.9
1988: +2.7
1989: +11.0
1990: +8.3
1991: +8.8
1992: +6.0
1993: ?
1994: +6.8
1995: +6.8
1996: +7.8

Hakeem net on/off
1994: +14.5
1995: +9.0
1996: +10.3

In none of the 12 full seasons did they come anywhere near the +35 on/off estimate over the same period.

2. There has only been a handful of +20 on/off net seasons in the last 25 years, none above +25. A +35 or + 45 on/off was never realistic in the first place, especially not by 3 players at the same time in just the few seasons prior. This was most likely just a calculation error somewhere in Dipper's spreadsheet which was repeated when he plugged in new numbers for different players.

Taking it at face value anyway...

Excellent work, man, thanks!

So, MJs career playoffs on-off per 100 poss is 14,7 with 7.55 ON. Maaan... LeBrons is 10,2 with 5,9 ON. Its not close actually the more we use analytical approach and impact data... In regular season I suppose the margin would be even wider because of "coasting".

Make that 2006-2021 Lebron and the playoff stuff is comparable with a 1994 Bull-sized elephant missing and the regular-season stuff being comparable without 94 or the bulk of 95.

That is also despite Lebron playing a much larger minute sample and staggering significantly more with co-stars.

IOW, nice try

[70sFan]

Why can't we just appreciate that we got new, significant data about one of the greatest players ever? Is it really necessary to turn everything into Jordan vs James debate?

[AEnigma]

Why can't we just appreciate that we got new, significant data about one of the greatest players ever? Is it really necessary to turn everything into Jordan vs James debate?

Data can be appreciated but it also should be vetted and contextualised properly.

Most of the playoff stuff tracks well enough and is pretty complete. Seems like we can get a few variations depending on the tracker, but broad scale not making too much of a difference. Partial seasons from singular sources resulting in what should be objectively strange results, that deserves to be interrogated more.

[falcolombardi]

Yeah, not sure about those 92 marks:

There is no way that +45 on/off net rating is remotely accurate.

1. Dipper had similarly high on/off estimates for Barkley (+36.3) and Hakeem (+34.5) but those estimates were disproven with Harvey Pollack's full season data.

Barkley net on/off
1987: +7.9
1988: +2.7
1989: +11.0
1990: +8.3
1991: +8.8
1992: +6.0
1993: ?
1994: +6.8
1995: +6.8
1996: +7.8

Hakeem net on/off
1994: +14.5
1995: +9.0
1996: +10.3

In none of the 12 full seasons did they come anywhere near the +35 on/off estimate over the same period.

2. There has only been a handful of +20 on/off net seasons in the last 25 years, none above +25. A +35 or + 45 on/off was never realistic in the first place, especially not by 3 players at the same time in just the few seasons prior. This was most likely just a calculation error somewhere in Dipper's spreadsheet which was repeated when he plugged in new numbers for different players.

Taking it at face value anyway...

Excellent work, man, thanks!

So, MJs career playoffs on-off per 100 poss is 14,7 with 7.55 ON. Maaan... LeBrons is 10,2 with 5,9 ON. Its not close actually the more we use analytical approach and impact data... In regular season I suppose the margin would be even wider because of "coasting".

Make that 2006-2021 Lebron and the playoff stuff is comparable with a 1994 Bull-sized elephant missing and the regular-season stuff being comparable without 94 or the bulk of 95.

That is also despite Lebron playing a much larger minute sample and staggering significantly more with co-stars.

IOW, nice try

Yep, lebron extended prime is larger sample than all of jordan bulls career which is why i never understand why these comparisions are always framed as either career vs career (where it inevitably rewards shorter careers) or very specific short stretches instead of larger prime samples or non consecutive best years (which inevitably hurts players who got down/injured years in the middle of their primes)

Is arbitrary and does affect the sample size and reliability of the data for both prime and peak comparisions

[Djoker]

Yeah, not sure about those 92 marks:

There is no way that +45 on/off net rating is remotely accurate.

1. Dipper had similarly high on/off estimates for Barkley (+36.3) and Hakeem (+34.5) but those estimates were disproven with Harvey Pollack's full season data.

Barkley net on/off
1987: +7.9
1988: +2.7
1989: +11.0
1990: +8.3
1991: +8.8
1992: +6.0
1993: ?
1994: +6.8
1995: +6.8
1996: +7.8

Hakeem net on/off
1994: +14.5
1995: +9.0
1996: +10.3

In none of the 12 full seasons did they come anywhere near the +35 on/off estimate over the same period.

2. There has only been a handful of +20 on/off net seasons in the last 25 years, none above +25. A +35 or + 45 on/off was never realistic in the first place, especially not by 3 players at the same time in just the few seasons prior. This was most likely just a calculation error somewhere in Dipper's spreadsheet which was repeated when he plugged in new numbers for different players.

Taking it at face value anyway...

Excellent work, man, thanks!

So, MJs career playoffs on-off per 100 poss is 14,7 with 7.55 ON. Maaan... LeBrons is 10,2 with 5,9 ON. Its not close actually the more we use analytical approach and impact data... In regular season I suppose the margin would be even wider because of "coasting".

Make that 2006-2021 Lebron and the playoff stuff is comparable with a 1994 Bull-sized elephant missing and the regular-season stuff being comparable without 94 or the bulk of 95.

That is also despite Lebron playing a much larger minute sample and staggering significantly more with co-stars.

IOW, nice try

Yep, lebron extended prime is larger sample than all of jordan bulls career which is why i never understand why these comparisions are always framed as either career vs career (where it inevitably rewards shorter careers) or very specific short stretches instead of larger prime samples or non consecutive best years (which inevitably hurts players who got down/injured years in the middle of their primes)

Is arbitrary and does affect the sample size and reliability of the data for both prime and peak comparisions

Since we have raw ON/OFF and minutes, feel free to do your own comparisons but non-consecutive best years is an approach that makes no sense. You're literally removing the worse data points when the whole purpose of using larger samples (i.e. consecutive stretches) is for the data to stabilize.

[falcolombardi]

Yeah, not sure about those 92 marks:

Taking it at face value anyway...

Make that 2006-2021 Lebron and the playoff stuff is comparable with a 1994 Bull-sized elephant missing and the regular-season stuff being comparable without 94 or the bulk of 95.

That is also despite Lebron playing a much larger minute sample and staggering significantly more with co-stars.

IOW, nice try

Yep, lebron extended prime is larger sample than all of jordan bulls career which is why i never understand why these comparisions are always framed as either career vs career (where it inevitably rewards shorter careers) or very specific short stretches instead of larger prime samples or non consecutive best years (which inevitably hurts players who got down/injured years in the middle of their primes)

Is arbitrary and does affect the sample size and reliability of the data for both prime and peak comparisions

Since we have raw ON/OFF and minutes, feel free to do your own comparisons but non-consecutive best years is an approach that makes no sense. You're literally removing the worse data points when the whole purpose of using larger samples (i.e. consecutive stretches) is for the data to stabilize.

No because based on that reasoning you could use 3 year consecutive and a player who provided 4 great years would be seen as added less value than one who provided 3 just because a injury year was in the middle

[Djoker]

Yep, lebron extended prime is larger sample than all of jordan bulls career which is why i never understand why these comparisions are always framed as either career vs career (where it inevitably rewards shorter careers) or very specific short stretches instead of larger prime samples or non consecutive best years (which inevitably hurts players who got down/injured years in the middle of their primes)

Is arbitrary and does affect the sample size and reliability of the data for both prime and peak comparisions

Since we have raw ON/OFF and minutes, feel free to do your own comparisons but non-consecutive best years is an approach that makes no sense. You're literally removing the worse data points when the whole purpose of using larger samples (i.e. consecutive stretches) is for the data to stabilize.

No because based on that reasoning you could use 3 year consecutive and a player who provided 4 great years would be seen as added less value than one who provided 3 just because a injury year was in the middle

Well in the case of injury I would second removing the year in question. But I thought your post was regarding Lebron's playoff career. He's never really had any confirmed serious injuries in the middle of peak playoff stretches, at least that I know of.

[falcolombardi]

Since we have raw ON/OFF and minutes, feel free to do your own comparisons but non-consecutive best years is an approach that makes no sense. You're literally removing the worse data points when the whole purpose of using larger samples (i.e. consecutive stretches) is for the data to stabilize.

No because based on that reasoning you could use 3 year consecutive and a player who provided 4 great years would be seen as added less value than one who provided 3 just because a injury year was in the middle

Well in the case of injury I would second removing the year in question. But I thought your post was regarding Lebron's playoff career. He's never really had any confirmed serious injuries in the middle of peak playoff stretches, at least that I know of.

Lebron was rather clearly hurt through 2015 playoffs with back issues as well as likely in 2010

[colts18]

Also, I said +900 or whatever, lol. That's an extreme extreme number. Guys we have on record who hit +900 on the season: '96 MJ, '15-'17 Curry, and '16 Green. Poor '96 Pippen one point short.

And given overall team quality/number of games in a season, it's entirely possible those are the only players to ever do it.

Teams with a points dif of better than 800 through 2019 were.

1971-72 Los Angeles Lakers* 1007
1970-71 Milwaukee Bucks* 1005
1995-96 Chicago Bulls* 1004
2016-17 Golden State Warriors* 954
1971-72 Milwaukee Bucks* 915
1996-97 Chicago Bulls* 886
2015-16 Golden State Warriors* 882
2015-16 San Antonio Spurs* 872
1991-92 Chicago Bulls* 856
2007-08 Boston Celtics* 841
2014-15 Golden State Warriors* 828

If (hypothetically) those teams maintained a constant points margin regardless of lineup (or did so with regard to the following players) the minute leaders and their "expected" pro-rata plus-minus would be

Wilt Chamberlain 883.0341254
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 835.0442366
Michael Jordan 786.2037506
Klay Thompson 638.8134479
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 828.7272497
Michael Jordan 697.3938165
Draymond Green 622.9014085
Kawhi Leonard 526.60746
Scottie Pippen 682.9006556
Paul Pierce 611.7524677
Stephen Curry 548.2929549

Your Wilt numbers are off. There is no way that Wilt was only +883 on a +1007 team. Wilt played all 82 games and was at 42.3 MPG. He only 482 minutes that season. He played 88% of the Lakers minutes. He is definitely over 900. He is possibly over +1000 assuming the Lakers were negative in the minutes he missed.

It's the same with the 1971 Bucks. Kareem played all 82 games at 40 MPG and Oscar played 81 at 39 MPG. They both likely beat the +900 since the Bucks were over +1000. The 1972 Bucks might be the same since Kareem played 81 games at 44 MPG.